Erwin Wils Of Millionaire Life Strategy On The Book That Changed His Life

An Interview With Sara Connell

Be aware who you surround yourself with. Like I said earlier, surround yourself with people that will elevate you. I maybe would have made some other choices back then.

Books have the power to shape, influence, and change our lives. Why is that so? What goes into a book that can shape lives? To address this we are interviewing people who can share a story about a book that changed their life, and why. As a part of our series, I had the pleasure of interviewing Erwin Wils.

Erwin Wils is a mindset and business strategist with Millionaire Life Strategy, an executive coaching organization that empowers female and tech entrepreneurs to boost their business and themselves, so they can confidently deliver their added value without feeling like an imposter. Through coaching, Wils transforms clients into the person that achieves their dreams, goals, and beyond. As a Master of Science in Electrical Engineering by education and certified professional hypnotherapist, master Soulkey therapist, EMDR (Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing) and IEMT (Integral Eye Movement Therapy) practitioner by training, Wils brings over 25 years of experience to show his clients how they can use their expertise to make a positive impact in the world and make a good living doing it.

Thank you so much for doing this with us! Before we dig in, our readers would like to get to know you a bit more. Can you tell us a bit about your “backstory” and how you grew up?

Of course! I never intended to become an entrepreneur. I grew up as an only child with two loving parents. Like many people, I was taught: “Do your best at school, get a degree and get a job” and that’s what I did. In my teenage years I competed in judo on subnational level, already trying to get the best out of me. I graduated as a Master of Science in electrical engineering at the University of Delft and started my corporate career. After 18 years of process optimization in the corporate world in different roles at several companies, I came to a realization, “You can optimize a process and have all the numbers and graphs to support it, but if the people that use the process don’t change, the process itself won’t change. So how do I get those people to change as well?”

I had heard about NLP (Neuro Linguistic Programming), did some research, got intrigued by hypnotherapy and decided to follow a hypnotherapy training and that totally changed my destination. After the first training weekend I just knew I wanted to do this for a living. Everything I loved doing came together. I love to help people in a coaching way, my work needs a challenge and I’m optimizing the most complex processes that exist: those of the internal human being. What started out as a future dream in about 5–10 years, became a reality in 2 years when I left my corporate job and started coaching full time. That first year of being fully self-employed was also the first year I decided to invest in a business coach for myself and that changed my business. One of my business coaches gave me a quote from a “certain author” and that actually changed my life. But we will come to that, just building a little suspense.

Let’s talk about what you are doing now, and how you achieved the success that you currently enjoy. Can you tell our readers a bit about the work you are doing?

I am a mindset and business strategist and I empower my clients to turn their passion into a profitable business. I make their blind spots visible. I get them out of vicious circles they find themselves in, share my knowledge, insights and experience and do whatever it takes to empower them to success.

I started out as a hypnotherapist 7 years ago helping people overcome all kinds of mental challenges. After 2 years I decided to put my focus on coaching, because I saw a lot of unused potential with my clients, yet they didn’t come to me to activate that, they just wanted to get rid of a problem they experienced. People that are looking for a coach, want to get the best out of themselves. You see, everybody limits himself or herself and I have a simple and effective challenge to prove that. Over 99% of the participants succeed, meaning they become aware they limit themselves. That’s just the start of their transformation. The reason I’m successful in my business is that I still use my hypnotherapy skills to empower my clients. According to a 2009 study published in the European Journal of Social Psychology, it takes 18 to 254 days for a person to form a new habit. The study also concluded that, on average, it takes 66 days for a new behavior to become automatic. Or it takes one hypnotherapy session of 60–90 minutes. Do I need to say more?

You are a successful leader. Which three character traits do you think were most instrumental to your success? Can you please share a story or example for each?

First one I want to mention is my positive mindset. I think that is key to my success. I truly believe everything happens for a reason and people get what they deserve. When people ask me if I would change anything when I could go back in the past, I honestly say “nothing,” because everything that happened in the past made me the man I am today and I’m pretty pleased with my life right now. I feel blessed to have a loving and supporting wife, which I consider to be my soulmate, 2 marvelous adopted sons, 2 lovely dogs, a house, 2 cars, my own business, great friends, everything. Did I achieve all my goals yet? No, but I know it’s coming. For me it’s not a matter of if, it’s just a matter of when. And until that moment, I’m fully enjoying the journey. And knowing myself, I probably will have some new goals by then.

Perseverance helps a lot as well. In my whole life, (I just finished my second round of becoming 25) I think I only let myself down twice and it still bothers me. To give you an example, during high school, I only scored a 1 once (Which is the lowest possible grade). It was for a German language test, strong verbs. I made one mistake too many, which resulted in that 1 and a 5 on my intermediate report. Only 5 I ever got as well. This was somewhere back in the eighties, I guess 1988, but it made me feel miserable and I can still remember it as if it was yesterday. That event motivates me to finish what I started.

The third character trait is that I consider myself to be the eternal student. I don’t mind asking questions, asking for help, making mistakes. Mistakes are great teachers and there is no such thing as a stupid question. There are enough stupid answers, but a stupid question doesn’t exist. That’s what I preach during my trainings as well. The only stupid question that exists, is the one not asked. My clients know that, and they will probably recognize it as well, because I ask them a lot of questions. Is it clear to you? Do you have any remarks or questions? Did that help? Anything else we need to address? I never assume they get what I’m sharing with them, so if something isn’t clear, I use another way of explaining something, until my client understands. Because it’s not about me, it’s all about them.

What’s the WHY behind the work that you do? Please share a story about this if you can.

I’ve always had a passion for helping people. As a young boy, I helped serving on birthday parties and I also remember when we had judo exams and my partner didn’t know a certain technique, I told him how to do it. Only thing was I couldn’t whisper softly enough, so our trainer repeatedly said that he should know it himself. The older I got, the more I wanted to help people in a coaching manner. Meaning I didn’t want them to become dependent on me, I wanted them to become self-reliant. That has been the common thread in my corporate career as well (and still is). When people or processes become dependent on me, I feel trapped and I need to get out. You could say I want to make myself obsolete. And that makes me feel proud. Funny fact though, when you help people that way, they come back to you for other things, because you truly helped them. For me, it currently feels like I’m living my passion, it energizes me and that’s what I want my clients to achieve as well.

None of us are able to achieve success without some help along the way. Is there a particular person who you are grateful towards who helped get you to where you are? Can you share a story about that?

I would definitely want to mention my wife and soulmate. We’re together for over 30 years already (and still counting), been through a lot and we support each other fully. I can truly say that she helped me become the man I am today. We don’t limit each other. We make big decisions together. We support each other where necessary, desired or needed. We complement one another perfectly. Of course, sometimes we have a different opinion now and then, little arguments, but in all those years we’ve been together, we never had a fight and I think that says a lot. I’m forever grateful for her being in my life, I truly feel blessed.

Awesome! Let’s now jump to the primary focus of our interview. I’m an author and I believe that books have the power to change lives. Can you please tell our readers about “The Book That Changed Your Life”? Can you share a story about how it impacted you?

Like I hinted earlier, it started with a quote that a business coach gave me. It was a quote from Napoleon Hill: “Whatever the mind can conceive and believe, it can achieve.” I never heard of the man before, but this quote made perfect sense to me. I was at a business event in Anaheim at the time and when I returned home, I bought the book “Think and Grow Rich” in the tax-free shop at the airport and started reading it in the airplane. And I couldn’t stop reading. It felt this book gave me the roadmap to success. I felt blessed that some components were already in place and it gave me handles to tackle other challenges. Napoleon Hill addresses a mastermind as a great asset to grow and that’s definitely true. An important lesson I took for myself is to be aware of whom you surround yourself with. If you want to grow, you need to surround yourself with people that will elevate you. From that moment on, I focused what people I wanted in my life and which roads would split. I think surrounding yourself with the right people is key to your success, that’s why I’m offering my own HANGOUT mastermind to my clients, both as a separate module, as well as part of my Profitable Passion Program™ year program.

What was the moment or series of events that made you decide that you wanted to take a specific course of action based on the inspiration from the book? Can you share a story about that?

Well, I think I already shared one just now, but let me share another one that is very powerful in my opinion. Napoleon Hill is talking about 13 steps towards riches. For me, most of them are summarized in the quote “whatever the mind can conceive and believe, it can achieve,” which has become my personal mantra. The book enforced my own beliefs and values and stimulated me to proceed and persevere. It made me look back on my life. I started to recognize events that validated the shared knowledge, so it enforced me to keep on going. I have a certain vision for my business and my life that will become reality someday. I don’t believe in failing, because it’s only failing when you quit and I have removed quitting from my system. Of course, I still make mistakes and those are great learnings. And that’s how I see those moments. I might run into a dead-end street sometimes and hit my nose hard, but at least I know that that wasn’t the right way, and I can exclude it from my journey. Like the saying “all roads lead to Rome.” I will find my own road. Or as I sometimes say, “Where there’s a Wils, a better way will be.”

Can you articulate why you think books in particular have the power to create movements, revolutions, and true change?

Before we had books, information was shared by word of mouth. Stories were told, and those stories changed every time. You can even test it. Have 5 to 10 people stand in line, let the first person share a story with the second one, second person to the third one, and see what’s left of the original story when the last person shares what he or she was told. The moment you start putting the stories in a book, the same story is shared with everybody, it doesn’t change any more. and when enough people share the same story, people start believing the story and it becomes a truth for them. And history has shown the power of books. Just think of probably the two most famous books of the world that influenced whole tribes: the Bible and the Quran.

A book has many aspects, of course. For example, you have the writing style, the narrative tense, the topic, the genre, the design, the cover, the size, etc. In your opinion, what are the main, essential ingredients needed to create a book that can change lives?

I believe that the readers should be able to associate with the content. Like my business coach said: “facts tell, stories sell.” People recognize themselves easier in a story than in facts. Do your best to present your teachings and learnings by means of stories.

People also have their own favorite representation system. The five representation systems are visual (seeing), auditory (hearing), kinesthetic (feeling), olfactory (smell), gustatory (taste). Most present ones are seeing, feeling and hearing. When you can include those representation systems into your storytelling, you will reach more people.

And of course, you should speak to the emotions and feelings of your readers. You might think you make your decisions based on reasoning, yet in fact you make your decisions based on feelings and emotions and use your reasoning to validate your decision. Feelings and emotions are great tools to engage your readers and it definitely helps them to associate with the content of your book.

I know there are many more ingredients that play a role in the success of your book and it shall depend on the genre as well. And I’m not a writing expert, but I truly believe that mentioned ingredients should be included in all books.

What are your “5 Things I Wish Someone Told Me Before I Started My Career” and why?

That’s a surprising question! I started my career back in ’96, so it has been a while. Although I am very satisfied with my life right now, don’t regret anything and all decisions made in the past made me the man I am right now, I can mention a few things.

First thing I would like to mention, is that the best investment you can make is in yourself. Invest in your personal development, because it will be worth it. I started doing this more actively when I began my entrepreneurial journey 7 years ago and I can’t even imagine what I was like 7 years ago.

Second thing is that you are responsible for your own happiness, don’t let it depend on others. The environment can influence your behavior and feelings, but you decide in what way. I remember a story of the Buddha and an angry young man. One day Buddha was walking in a village. A very angry and rude young man came up and began insulting him, saying all kind of rude words and Buddha just smiled. After a few minutes, the young man disappeared again in anger. A young student saw what happened and asked Buddha how he kept so calm. Buddha asked the student: “When somebody wants to give you a present and you don’t accept it, whom does this present belongs to?” Of course, to the other person. That’s right, buddha replied, and the same goes for that anger. If you don’t accept the anger, it stays with the person.

Third thing I would like to mention is to believe in yourself and stay authentic. Don’t change who you are to fit in, because you were meant to stand out. Luckily, I have always stayed true to myself. For instance, I never started smoking nor drinking just to fit in. Back in high school, my classmates started drinking beer and wanted me to taste it. I tasted the beer and didn’t like it. I still remember they said that I would get used to it and I replied, “If I don’t like it, why would I want to get used to it?”

Fourth thing is to be aware who you surround yourself with. Like I said earlier, surround yourself with people that will elevate you. I maybe would have made some other choices back then.

Fifth and final thing, I definitely would have liked if someone told me that when I started my career back in ’96 (using hindsight right now), “The first moment you hear something about a virtual currency called Bitcoin, buy loads of it and keep it for several years!” Do I need to explain?

The world, of course, needs progress in many areas. What movement do you hope someone (or you!) starts next? Can you explain why that is so important?

I would love to transform the educational system. It is still based on the industrial age and not the information age we’re currently in. Kids should be motivated and stimulated to develop their talents, and not be pushed into a straight jacket. And their entrepreneurial skills should be developed. For instance, I truly believe that the book “Think and Grow Rich” should be mandatory on high schools.

I believe children are our future and entrepreneurs are the ones that will change the world, so make sure our future generations are equipped and ready to do so.

How can our readers further follow your work online?

Of course they can visit my website https://millionairelifestrategy.com, connect with me on LinkedIn (https://www.linedin.com/in/erwin-wils) or follow my podcast “Follow your Passion” at https://www.follow-your-passion.biz .

Thank you so much for taking the time to share with us and our readers. We know that it will make a tremendous difference and impact thousands of lives. We are excited to connect further and we wish you so much joy in your next success.